


Walnuts

by Hakanaki



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Pancakes, RvB Angst War, Season 15
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-13
Updated: 2017-06-13
Packaged: 2018-11-13 16:15:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11188752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hakanaki/pseuds/Hakanaki
Summary: Spoilers for Season 15, Episode 5Caboose has to find a way to deal with this. He has always found a way to spring up after tragedy--it’s the thing Wash has always admired the most about him, about all of them.They spring back up and brush the grief from their armor, whisking it away with resolve and tenacity.(Except when they don’t.)Or: Wash and Tucker have a late-night conversation about their teammate.





	Walnuts

**Author's Note:**

> The wonderful [Anne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anneapocalypse/pseuds/anneapocalypse) prompted me with "Caboose genuinely doesn't seem to understand that Epsilon is gone. Tucker and Wash discuss whether they need to have a talk with him." I feel like this only fits the prompt by the skin of its teeth BUT HERE HAVE SOME ANGST.

The island is pristine, green, and natural. The second they’d landed, there had been a palpable release of tension from everyone’s shoulders. In almost perfect unison, they had removed their helmets and let them fall, heavy weights dropped onto lush grass with the kind of inaudible thud that grief and loss entail.

Unfortunately, grief and loss do not shed themselves as easily as armor.

They’d all found their ways of coping. Sarge mustered his way into Red Base, muttering something about fortifications and standards. The explosions and modifications haven’t stopped since. Grif and Simmons huddle together on the roof, just shy of errant limbs knocking into one another as they stand around and talk. Donut is experimenting with some kind of perfume line. Tucker makes pancake after pancake, banging pots and pans and snarling at anyone who so dares to enter Blue Base’s kitchen. Even Carolina is beginning to relax, flitting between bases with restless energy, but pausing at each to try a bite of Tucker’s newest creation or banter with Grif about Game of Thrones.

Wash knows that grief and loss can become like another set of armor, if you’re not careful. He removes his more often, polishing each piece until it shines, until he’s reassured that no, it’s not going to stick to him, not permanently, not this time.

Caboose… has never dealt with loss well.

He shuffles around Blue Base, muttering to himself about tanks and ghosts and taxes, and even though Wash isn’t entirely sure what he’s talking about when he starts rambling on about spirits and talking warthogs, he gets the gist of it when Caboose asks him if he might consider changing his armor back to blue.

Carolina pulls him aside after she chases Caboose off of the cliffs, where he was searching for a new best friend, the flush of adrenaline from the chase still high on her cheekbones. “You need to talk to him,” she says, and it’s not a request.

But Wash doesn’t have a helmet to fix this time.

* * *

He hadn’t _really_ thought sleep would come any easier on the island. He hoped it might, that it’d be easier to close his eyes without having to think about Epsilon in the next room.

The guilt his momentary, half-baked relief brought squashed that thought as quick as it came.

He finds himself sitting in the dark kitchen more nights than not, and if he spends more of that time scrolling mindlessly through his datapad than watching the exits, he’ll consider it improvement.

He’s not usually alone in his vigil--none of them are strangers to insomnia, after all. If he turns on a light, sometimes one of the Reds will even drop by. Tonight, it’s Tucker he has for company--Tucker who stress cooks, who creates some of his most scrumptious pancakes between the hours of 0200 and 0600.

“Are we going to stop avoiding this yet?” Tucker asks him, voice hoarse and eyes tired. He slides a stack of pancakes over to Wash, smooth and casual, like they’ve done this a million times before.

(They have.)

Wash opens his mouth to request the bottle of syrup, but Tucker pushes it across the table before he can ask. “Avoiding what?” he asks instead, drawing a syrup spiral onto his pancakes. He considers the stack for a moment before upending the bottle directly above center and letting it pour.

When his pancakes are properly coated, syrup threatening the edges of his plate, he finally looks up. Tucker glaring at him as he drenches his food with sugar is nothing new, but this isn’t Tucker’s _you’re-gonna-get-diabetes_ glare.

Wash is running on something like five hours of sleep over three days. He doesn’t have the patience to puzzle out what each crease in Tucker’s forehead means.

“I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about,” he clarifies, stuffing a bite of pancake into his mouth. Fluffy with a hint of cinnamon. Tucker is anxious tonight.

“Caboose,” Tucker says wearily, dropping his face into his hands and massaging his hairline. Tension headache. The weight of his dreads don’t help them, Wash knows.

There’s sliced walnuts in the pancakes, he realizes as he bites into one. Worried then, not just anxious. He sighs between bites, allows Tucker’s unspoken emotions to coat his tongue in the aftertaste. The walnuts are bitter.

“What do you think we should do?” he tries, taking another bite. Needs more syrup.

“Talk to him? Make sure he stops looking for new friends in the ocean? You think I know? What do you think I’m asking _you_ for?” Tucker snaps, lifting is face from his hands to level Wash with another glare. “And stop ruining my pancakes with that shit,” he continues.

Wash pauses, hand halfway to the bottle. He meets Tucker’s glare, more exhaustion than actual ire, and dumps another flowing pile of syrup on top of his pancakes.

“Sorry,” Tucker says after a beat, “I just… I’m _sick_ of this.”

“Tucker, I know it’s difficult--”

“Don’t patronize me, dude.”

“I’m not patronizing you,” Wash says, annoyed.

Caboose _has_ to find a way to deal with this. He has always found a way to spring up after tragedy--it’s the thing Wash has always admired the most about him, about all of them.

They spring back up and brush the grief from their armor, whisking it away with resolve and tenacity.

(Except when they don’t.)

“I just don’t get it,” Tucker murmurs after a moment. “He was _there._ He saw how it went down. How Church just… how he just…” he trails off, staring at the syrup bottle morosely.

“I know.”

“He was just… gone. Just like that.”

“I know, Tucker.”

“He had been yelling at Caboose when it happened, about his leg. How the _hell_ can he not _get it?_ ”

“I know, Tucker, but--”

“No, dude. You _don’t,_ ” Tucker snaps, planting his hands on the table and scooting his chair back. The glare he levels at Wash this time is familiar, closed-off. It sours his stomach. “You weren’t _there_ when Church decided to just--to just _delete_ himself inside my brain! You don’t know what it’s like--”

The silence that falls over the kitchen is sudden and heavy. Bitter, like walnuts. Wash looks away from Tucker, away from his half-eaten pancakes, to stare at a stain on the wall. Caboose put it there trying to microwave an MRE, the way Church had taught him, he’d insisted, by not removing the foil first. Even  _thinking_ about Church makes the lingering sweetness on the back of his tongue taste of vinegar.

“Wash… I--”

“I’m going for a walk,” Wash announces to the wall. If his throat feels a bit tight, then well, he did eat a lot of syrup without drinking anything. If his voice is a bit strained, then after all, he is running on five hours of sleep over three days. He pushes himself away from the table and makes his way to the entrance.

“You’re going for a walk,” Tucker deadpans, incredulous.

“I’m going for a walk,” Wash repeats, and yeah, the tightness in his throat is definitely because of the syrup. “To go clear my head.”

His mouth tastes bitter as he leaves, the wind an unfriendly breath on the back of his neck. Must be the walnuts.


End file.
